As the Chief Strategy Officer, Tien Tzuo brings to Salesforce.com over 16 years of experience in the enterprise software industry. Since he joined the company in 1999, Tzuo has been responsible for setting the vision, strategy, direction and design of Salesforce.com's award winning product line, including overseeing the launch of Salesforce, Supportforce, Customforce, Sforce, and Wireless Edition. In 2004, Tzuo was named CMO of the Year Finalist by the CMO Council and BusinessWeek Magazine. Tzuo came to salesforce.com from CrossWorlds Software, where he spearheaded CrossWorlds product, marketing and sales push into the Telecommunications vertical worldwide. Prior to CrossWorlds, Tzuo spent over six years at Oracle Corporation in a variety of sales and professional services roles.
Mr. Tzuo holds a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering from Cornell University and a master's in business administration from the Stanford Graduate School of Business.

Tien Tzuo, Chief Strategy Officer for Salesforce.com, describes seven lessons for transforming an enterprise software business from a traditional direct sales model to one which leverages the internet to produce in-bound sales. He stresses the awareness cycle for Salesforce.com's products, free-trial offers, onion-based product design and the continuing importance of events in the complex enterprise software industry.

Tien Tzuo, Chief Strategy Officer for Salesforce.com, believes that investments are shifting from direct-marketing campaigns to online marketing. Customer awareness is created through buzz, PR and dialogues in the marketplace rather than spending a great deal on advertising.

With increasingly demanding 21st century customers, Tzuo believes that it is important to provide them with a free trial of the product. This implies that one has to serve the customers even before they have committed, despite resistance from the sales representatives.

Tzuo talks about a methodology used for designing complex products. It involves creating a layered application with dummy samples. The first layer is intuitive and simple. As the layers are peeled, functionality and complexity increase. The customers can choose the degree to which they remove the peels.

In the enterprise software industry, Tzuo talks about how there has been a shift from the "field-sales" model, where traditional sales representatives win deals from big customers, to a "two-tier-sales" model. This is fueled by customers coming to the website rather than the sales representatives approaching them, creating a need for another tier of sales people to serve as telesales representatives.

Tzuo talks about how despite the importance of traditional events diminishing with the creation of an online experience, there is still a human factor involved in the customer's decision-making process. They want to see the product, interact with sales reps and talk to other customers. Creating this experience is important for any software company, he adds.

Tzuo explains that with a free trial product model, a high percentage of customers don't end up buying the product. However, it is still important to provide post sales service. A good point of sustainability is when customers have been using the product for some time and it is difficult to unplug them from it, he says.

Tzuo believes that as a company grows in revenue and complexity, it is important to have a metrics driven sales model. Factors such as the number of people visiting the company's website, effectiveness of search engine marketing, qualification rates, close rates and average size of deals are all important metrics which help in building a baseline. Tweaking these metrics can improve results and lead to a deeper understanding of the market, he adds.

In the internet business, the threat from competitors for small and mid-sized organizations is very high, says Tzuo. For this reason, companies like Salesforce.com define the battlefield by not competing with big names. Instead, they cooperate with them to build barriers to entry by investing in technology. Acquiring the right talent from the industry further strengthens these barriers, he adds.